The Satellite Dish
by WhazzupPeeps
Summary: Lo has a dream in which she's a character in a 1960s-style TV sitcom, but with a 21st-century twist. She and Fin try to install a new TV satellite dish in the dream, with humorous results. A tribute to, and parody of, sitcoms from the Golden Age of TV.
1. Tube's Broken? Why Worry?

**CHAPTER 1 - TUBE'S BROKEN? WHY WORRY?  
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**This is my second _Stoked_ fanfic to be uploaded, something a little more lighthearted this time around. Here, our favorite hotel heiress Lo has a dream where she's a character in a 1960s-style sitcom (as noted in the story header), but with a few 21st-century twists. One of those twists is Lo's awareness that she's a sitcom character in her dream. Fin co-stars as the sensible blonde best friend to Lo's wacky brunette as they get into a little adventure involving the title object.**

**Also as noted, this story is a tribute to (and parody of) sitcoms of the 1950s and 1960s. Chronologically, it is also set during the same weekend as my earlier fanfic "Luck Has a Way", putting it just after "Charging into the Night" in the show's timeline.  
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Over at the Surfer's Paradise hotel staff house, it was half past midnight and things were quiet. Just a couple of hours earlier, in Fin, Emma and Lo's room, the three girls had gone online via Fin's laptop computer to watch video clips of old TV sitcoms form the 1950s and 1960s on the YouView site, on a lark. The girls had been laughing at the shows they were watching, not so much because they found them funny in most cases, but because they found the shows kitschy and quaint by present-day standards. While Lo, Fin and Emma each made their own quips about the sitcoms they watched, all agreed that they actually found those shows funny compared with the present-day sitcoms that Reef mentioned he liked watching.

The one time when Reef and the girls watched a DVD of one of his favorite sitcoms, _Dorm Life_ (a show about college freshmen and their misadventures on campus) on his own laptop, Fin, Lo and Emma were barely able to sit through half of the show before the girls walked out on it, with all three saying that the show sucked and was not a bit funny, and Fin adding that she thought some scenes and jokes in the show were sexist. When Reef dismissed Fin's criticism of his show and said he found it funny, Fin retorted that anyone who thought _Dorm Life_ was funny was as moronic as the characters and storylines in the show. Thinking back to that time, it made Lo, Fin and Emma agree about the quality of the comedies from TV's classic age compared with many of the comedies of today, especially after they began watching a clip of one such classic 1960s sitcom, _The Lacey Show_, which the girls laughed their way through thanks to the physical comedy and the wacky situations the show's main character found herself in.

Now, as Lo, Emma and Fin were all fast asleep in their own beds, Lo started turning in her bed in her sleep as she began to have a dream...

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Down in the staff house's common living room, Lo was watching the junky old black-and-white TV set with Fin when she began to realize that something seemed off to her. _Okay, hold on a minute,_ Lo thought to herself as she checked out the surroundings in the living room. _Maybe it's me, but why am I hearing music that's not coming from the TV, and why does it sound like the same kind of background music from those old TV sitcoms I was watching with Fin and Emma last night? And wait,_ she added as she suddenly had an epiphany about what she was experiencing. _Why am I seeing everything in black-and-white? Am __**I**_ _in one of those old shows myself? If I am, why does everything in the staff house still look the same? And how come I keep hearing laughter whenever I say something?_ Lo thought, realizing that she was hearing the sounds of a laugh track.

Lo's perception of her surroundings aside, she and Fin were sitting on the couch as they watched the TV set's only available channel off the set-top antenna, the CBC. Lo was munching on strawberries while Fin was digging into a snack-size bag of potato chips as they watched TV, and both were looking bored with what they were watching. The two girls were wishing they could be out surfing at the Office, but rainy and windy weather outside the staff house made it undesirable for Lo and Fin to want to hit the waves that day.

As the girls continued watching the TV, the picture on the set began to act up, becoming snowy and developing lines. "What?" Fin said, getting up to check how the TV was. "Come on now, I don't need this!" she said as she banged the top of the set with her open hand first, then with her fist, to try to improve the picture. "Work, darn you!"

"Maybe it's the weather outside," Lo remarked. "It's happened before when the weather got bad out there. Maybe if you fixed up the antenna a little..."

"Trust me, it's not the weather," Fin replied. "The set's been acting up like this the past three days in a row and it was nice out all those times. If you want it to work better, banging on the set a few times to improve the picture usually works." She then went back to work on the TV set, exhorting it to work better as she continued to bang on the top, then on the sides, when suddenly, the picture winked out and the screen went black, accompanied by the sound of a buzz from the ancient set's cathode ray tube that faded a moment later. Looking at the now-black screen, Fin sighed resignedly and said, "Well, that's it. This pile of junk is officially dead."

"Oh, crud," Lo said. "Guess all it's good for now is as a vintage-looking stand to put stuff on."

"Calling this set 'vintage' about covers it," Fin said. "Didn't they stop making black-and-white TVs back in, like, 1978 or something?"

Lo shrugged her shoulders at Fin's question. "So, now we can't watch TV because the old set's toast, and we can't really go surfing because it's raining and windy outside," she said. "What do you wanna do, then?"

"Beats me," Fin replied with her own shrug. "What do you wanna do?"

"I dunno," said Lo, shrugging again. "I guess we'll just sit on the couch and be bored, then." As the canned laughter followed Lo's comment again, she and Fin then sat motionless on the couch for a few moments, staring at the blank TV screen while Lo heard that 1950s sitcom background music again, before Lo's eyes shifted to the windows overlooking the front porch of the staff house and she noticed that the wind had stopped and the rain was slowing to a drizzle. An inspiration then hit Lo as she smiled and her eyes lit up. "Hey, I've got an idea," she perked up.

"Right now, I'm open to anything if it means not sitting on the couch staring into space," Fin said. "What do you got?"

"We can go get a new widescreen TV for the staff house," Lo suggested. "I _totally_ miss watching my favorite shows in HD."

"Good call, except for a couple of issues," Fin said, raising an eyebrow at Lo. "A: What's the point of getting a widescreen TV just to watch one channel on," she added, "and B: How do you plan to pay for a TV set? Last I checked, your dad cut off your credit cards and you weren't exactly making top dollars waitressing at the Pirate Ship, even with tips."

"Easy," said Lo. "First, we'll get a satellite dish to go with the new TV so we can get all the channels we like, and second, Daddy may have taken away my credit cards, but I still have a means of getting what we need."

"_Reeeally?_" Fin said with a sly look. "What do you have in mind, exactly?"

"I've got about $3000 in 'mad money' stashed away back in the penthouse," Lo said. "That's enough to cover the cost of a 52-inch LCD set and a satellite dish and receiver _and_ still have enough cash left over afterward."

"Okay, so how're you gonna get your 'mad money'?" Fin wondered. "Didn't your dad also ban you from the penthouse until you can prove to him that you've become more responsible after what happened with your party?"

"I've got it covered," Lo said reassuringly. "Daddy's out of town for the weekend on a fishing trip and he took Ty and George with him, so it's just Mom at the penthouse. I'll call her and ask her to find the money, tell her what it's for and ask her to bring it down to me, then I'll call the Kahuna to take me and you into town to go TV shopping and hang out for the day. Cool?"

Fin shrugged and smirked. "Okay, you won me over," she said as a happy Lo then took out her cell phone to call her mother at the Ridgemount penthouse at the top of Surfer's Paradise.

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**As you might guess in this chapter, the old show Lo, Fin and Emma were watching online, _The Lacey Show_, is a takeoff of _The Lucy Show_**. **Would it be surprising if, when writing for Lo on _Stoked_, some of the show's writers may have been influenced by some of Lucille Ball's characters while writing about Lo's misadventures?  
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**There'll be more to come next chapter as Lo and Fin go shopping for that new TV set and satellite dish, with appearances by a couple of familiar characters along the way - same _Stoked_ time, same _Stoked_ channel. :D  
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**_Stoked_ (c) Fresh TV and Teletoon. I don't own the show or any of the characters.  
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	2. Shop 'til You Drop

**CHAPTER 2 - SHOP 'TIL YOU DROP  
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**And away we go again as Lo's 1960s sitcom dream continues...**

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After calling her mother to get her emergency money stash from her bedroom in the penthouse, then calling the Kahuna to arrange a ride into Sunset Beach on the Whalebus, Lo took Fin with her to the hotel to rendezvous in the lobby with Lo's mother, who brought her daughter's "mad money" down with her. "It's all in there, is it?" Lo asked her mother. "I just hope George didn't go snooping in my room while I was gone and find and steal any of it."

"It's okay, dear," Mrs. Ridgemount assured her daughter. "George hasn't been in your room at all since you left the penthouse. I'd know or Rosie would know if George tried to get into your room, so he knows better."

_Yeah, if that little troll knows what's good for him,_ Lo thought to herself about her youngest brother, followed by more canned laughter in response. Puzzled about the reappearance of the laugh track in her dream, she wondered, _Okay, what is __**up**__ with that laughter out of nowhere again?_

"Anyway," Mrs. Ridgemount continued, "I checked your money and you have $3050 here. Is that what you had when your father sent you down to the staff house?"

Lo breathed a sigh of relief. "Yep, that's all of it," she said. Taking the money and putting it in her purse, Lo then gave her mother a big hug. "Thanks Mom, you're the best!" said a grateful Lo.

"Always happy to help, sweetie," Mrs. Ridgemount replied, responding to her daughter's hug in kind. "Hope you'll enjoy your new TV set for the staff house. See you later for dinner?"

"Sure," Lo said. "Bye, Mom," she added, waving to her mother as she and Fin turned to head to the hotel's front entrance, where the Whalebus was already waiting. "Hey, Kahuna!" Lo and Fin said together in greeting to the Kahuna as they boarded the bus, with Lo adding, "How goes it?"

"Groovy, chiquitas," Kahuna replied. "What's on tap for the two of you today?"

"Going to town to shop and hang out," Fin said. "Lo's been hearing a new TV set calling her name since the old one at the staff house died."

Raising his eyebrows in puzzlement at Fin's comment, Kahuna cupped a hand to his left ear as he leaned toward the driver's side window to listen for the TV set "calling Lo's name", followed by the laugh track that only Lo could hear. "Well, if shopping calls," Kahuna quipped as he shrugged, "you gotta accept the charges."

_And there's that canned laughter again,_ Lo thought to herself as she heard it after Kahuna spoke, just as the Whalebus pulled away from the hotel front entrance to start the trip into Sunset Beach.

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Upon arriving in Sunset Beach, Lo and Fin headed into a local electronics store on the town's main street that had the equipment the girls needed to get for the staff house. As Lo and Fin browsed the widescreen TV section, the background music playing in Lo's dream changed from 1950s sitcom music to 1960s instrumental Bossa Nova, which puzzled Lo again as she listened, but she shrugged her shoulders in resignation and decided to go with the flow of the music.

As Lo studied some of the TV sets on display, a saleswoman on duty, who recognized Lo as a regular customer, approached her. "Hi, Miss Ridgemount," the saleswoman greeted her. "Anything I can help you with?"

Lo turned and recognized the saleswoman. "Hi, Marilyn!" she said, returning the greeting. "There sure is. I'm looking for a new widescreen TV set, a good-sized LCD one - maybe a 52-incher?"

"I can go one better for you," Marilyn said, showing Lo a particular set close by. "We've got a 55-inch LCD here on special this week, for the same price as a 52-inch set. Full HD, home theatre-ready, all the works."

"Awesome!" Lo said, looking pleased with the set she was shown. "I'm also gonna need a satellite dish and receiver to go with that set."

"Then you're in luck," Marilyn said as she took Lo and Fin over to the satellite and cable receiver section. "There's also a special on for a dish with two HD receivers to hook up in two rooms, with the option to hook up an outside hard drive to get PVR functions."

"Oh, that sounds _sooo_ cool," Lo remarked. "I'll take them."

"Great choice," said Marilyn as she headed to the cash register at the front of the store, followed by Lo and Fin. "You won't regret it either, you'll love that TV and the receivers once you get them home. Okay," she added as she checked the register to ring up the sale, "checking the account database under Lauren Ridgemount." Lo eagerly waited in anticipation of getting the new TV and satellite dish with twin receivers, but Marilyn paused a moment and frowned as she located Lo's account on the store database. "Oh, wait a minute," said the saleswoman. "It says here your store account's been suspended, under orders from your father."

Lo and Fin looked at each other for a moment, then Lo dug into her purse and pulled out her wad of money. "Will a straight cash payment work?" she said with a grin, fanning out the stack of cash to show Marilyn.

"Cash works for us too," said Marilyn, smiling as she proceeded to make the sale. "We'll have all your stuff ready for you to pick up in an hour or two, Miss Ridgemount."

"Nice!" Fin said, slapping five with a pleased Lo upon the successful purchase of the new widescreen TV and satellite dish.

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After the electronics store, Lo and Fin next visited a nearby ladies' clothing store, where Fin bought an outfit of a sleeveless shirt and tights similar to what she usually wore when off-duty from the hotel's housekeeping services, except in shades of blue instead of green, while Lo acquired three new dresses, including a teal-colored one that she chose to wear out of the store after paying for it. To Lo's chagrin, however, because of her dream being in black-and-white, she could only see the colors of her new dresses in shades of grey. Following that, a hungry Lo and Fin then went off to get hot dogs and frozen lemonades for lunch at a burger and hot dog stand close to the pier extending from Sunset Beach's waterfront boardwalk, where the girls then went to people-watch as they ate.

After swallowing a bite of her cheese and relish-covered hot dog, Fin remarked to Lo, "Great choice of TV for the 'roach motel', Lo, and good call on getting satellite too. Reef and the guys really dig their sports on TV, so they're gonna love you for getting all that new hardware. In fact," she added, "_I_ love you for it already because it means now I'll get to watch surfing competitions and beach volleyball when they come on."

"So then," Lo said in a wry tone, "how much will you, Emma and Kelly love me when you also get to watch your favorite movies and TV shows in sensational widescreen?"

"A lot," Fin answered as she and Lo then laughed. As they continued talking, Lo and Fin caught the attention of two boys carrying surfboards as they passed by along the boardwalk, and the boys smiled and waved at the two pretty girls who were eyeing them from the pier while walking by. After waving back to the two surfers, Lo and Fin then turned back to the waterfront to watch the activity on the water when they spotted someone familiar windsurfing on the water near the pier. "Hey, Ripper!" the girls said, calling over to the Australian surfer and fellow Surfer's Paradise staffer.

"G'day, mates!" Ripper called back from his windsurfer board as he spotted Lo and Fin, then prepared to land his craft on the beach. "How's it goin'?"

"Since when did you take up windsurfing?" Fin asked Ripper as he came up to meet the girls on the pier. "Whenever we see you on the waves, it's usually on your regular board."

"Just something I thought I'd give a shot," Ripper said. "It ain't that bad and I picked up on it right quick, but it can't beat surfin' the old-fashioned way. So how come you sheilas aren't out hitting the surf yourselves?"

"The old TV set back at the staff house just died on us, so we've been out TV shopping," Lo explained. "I just bought a 55-inch widescreen and two satellite receivers, so now we'll be able to watch all the shows we like once we get everything set up."

"Oh, strewth!" Ripper exclaimed, sounding thrilled. "Good on ya, love. Now I'll be able to watch Aussie rules when it's on."

"Don't forget the surfing competitions," Fin added.

"Yeah, that too," Ripper said with a chuckle. Just then, he and the girls spotted another familiar figure approaching on a windsurfer board.

"Hey, isn't that Reef out there windsurfing?" Fin wondered aloud.

"Yeah, that's him," Ripper confirmed. "You never know what kind of garbage the tide'll wash in 'til you see it," he added, drawing laughter from Lo and Fin and, once again as Lo quickly noticed, activating the laugh track.

"Hey Ripper, ladies," Reef called over to the group as soon as he saw them on the pier. "Check me out! You're lookin' at the new king of the windsurfers in action!"

"Really?" Fin called back to Reef as she made a show of looking around where he was. "I don't see him anywhere, but as soon as he shows up, let me know!" she added, making Lo and Ripper laugh.

"Joke all you want," said Reef, brushing off Fin's barb, "but take a look at these killer moves!" As Reef proceeded to show off and grandstand on his windsurfer board for the girls and Ripper, though, a seagull flying overhead in the area positioned itself over the cocky surfer's head and "dropped a bomb" that landed with a splat on its intended target, startling Reef and causing him to fall off his board and land in the water. Upon seeing this, Lo, Fin and Ripper all began to laugh out loud at Reef's expense, and Lo did not even mind at that point when the canned laughter in her dream joined in.

"I think I can speak for everyone here when I say I never get tired of seein' that happen," Ripper said as he saw a chagrined-looking Reef resurface and spit out water while Lo and Fin continued laughing.

"No argument there," Lo agreed. Checking the time on her watch, she then turned and said to Fin, "Hey, our new TV and satellite should be ready to pick up at the store by now. Wanna head over there now while I call Kahuna to come get us?"

"You do that, love," Ripper said to Lo before she and Fin said their goodbyes to him and prepared to go back for the new TV. "I'm gonna hit the water again and sail back to the Office. See you back at the hotel."

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**Lunch and a shopping spree for the girls, plus appearances by our favorite Aussie dude Ripper and the always-cocky Reef, who I included here mainly to make the butt of jokes. Just a few items to lead up to what's coming next chapter when Lo and Fin get the satellite dish back to the staff house to install. That chapter gets interesting as a couple of familiar adversaries also make an appearance.**

**Thanks for the reviews so far, and keep 'em coming.  
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	3. The Handy Girls Get to Work

**CHAPTER 3 - THE HANDY GIRLS GET TO WORK  
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Upon returning from Sunset Beach to the hotel staff house in the Whalebus, Lo and Fin got help from the Kahuna in unloading their widescreen TV and satellite receivers and bringing them inside before Kahuna left to go about other business on his schedule. The girls got the new TV out of its cardboard box and had no problem setting it up, but when they took out the satellite dish and its twin receivers from their box, Lo and Fin realized there would be more of a problem with the satellite setup.

"You know, we'd get one of the guys to help us install the dish outside," Fin said, "but Reef, Broseph, Johnny and Ripper are all off surfing at the Office, Ty's out of town with your dad and the Kahuna's busy elsewhere."

"As for the girls," Lo added, "Emma's with the guys at the Office and Kelly's gone to Campbell River for the day, so they can't help us either. With no one else here to help us, you know what this means?"

"No, and I'm almost afraid to ask," Fin said with a cockeyed look directed at Lo, who heard the laugh track once again as she also heard more 1950s sitcom background music begin playing in her dream. "What does it mean?"

"It means we'll have to install the dish ourselves," Lo answered. "What could go wrong with the two of us doing it?"

"That depends," said a still-wary Fin. "Where do you want to install the dish?"

"I was thinking up on the roof," Lo suggested. "If we attach it to the chimney at the back of the house, the dish will have a good sight line to pick up all the channels we want to get clearly."

"Whoa, wait a minute," Fin said. "Up on the roof? Are you nuts? One, the roof has a bit of a slope to it in places, and two, it's probably still slippery from the rain earlier, and I'd rather not slip and fall and either get killed or break bones or dislocate a joint or two anywhere in my body, okay? I'd like to still be in one piece in time to compete in Gromfest down the road."

"Not a problem if we use ropes to tie to the spires on top of the roof gables, or to the chimney," Lo said, "and use them to hoist up the dish and the tool box. Besides, if the roof's dry by now and we're careful up there, we can get the dish installed and hooked up in no time and we'll be able to watch TV by tonight." Lo then clasped her hands together and put a twinkle in her eyes as she pleaded with Fin to help her. "C'mon, Fin, please? Pretty pretty please?"

Fin rolled her eyes upward as she shrugged her shoulders. "Fine, I'll do it," she said resignedly. As a delighted Lo went off to get some rope, Fin said to herself while following her friend to get an extending ladder, "I have a feeling I'm going to live to regret this_._"

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Once Lo went up on the roof covering the second-floor outside walkway of the staff house after the ladder was propped against its edge, Fin, preferring not to carry the heavy tool box up the ladder with her, tied one end of a rope to the tool box handle and got Lo to pull the box up to the top of the ladder, helping her friend by guiding the box up. Halfway up the ladder, Fin had to stop to scratch an itch on her right arm, but Lo kept pulling on the rope, not noticing that Fin had stopped, before the tool box snagged on a ladder rung close to the top.

As Fin was about to resume climbing and noticed that the tool box was gone, she looked up and saw Lo still pulling on the rope with the box still stuck on the rung. "Lo, stop pulling! You're stuck!" Fin yelled to her.

"What?" Lo, who did not clearly hear Fin the first time, called back.

"I said you're stuck on the..." Fin began, but she did not get to finish her sentence before she saw the tool box fly upward as Lo, using all the strength she could, gave the rope a big pull. Seeing the tool box coming at her, Lo gasped and ducked on instinct as the box sailed over her head. Lo, who was shielding her head with her arms, then heard the sound of glass breaking a second later.

"Okay, what did I just hit?" said Lo, afraid to look as Fin reached the top of the ladder to check on her.

"Hmm," Fin mused, studying the damage done as she looked. "Looks to me like the window to Reef's room," she added with a smirk and a slight giggle. Hearing the sound of children's laughter in the distance behind her, then turning to see the bratty brothers Todd and Mark Marvin running around playing tag some distance away, Fin then turned back to Lo. "If Reef asks, we'll just say it was the Marvin boys," Fin said, pointing her thumb back toward the two. "Those two rugrats are always running around causing damage anyway, so why not?" After she and Lo shared a laugh, Fin then retrieved the tool box and untied the rope before climbing back down to get the satellite dish, which she took back up with her before she and Lo started walking on the walkway roof with the equipment.

"Now this is one of the parts I'm not too sure about," Fin said to Lo as she looked down at the boards covering the walkway roof. "How come your dad doesn't look into having the staff house fixed up, starting with these boards we're walking on? Some of them look rotten to me."

Lo took a look down to check for herself. "The boards look okay to me," she said, shrugging her shoulders as she continued to carry the satellite dish and the rope. As she took a step on one board, however, Lo's left foot went through it and she gasped audibly as she stumbled, barely hanging on to the dish. Reacting on instinct as soon as she saw what happened, Fin dropped the tool box and went to grab Lo to keep her from falling down and getting hurt.

"So, what was it you said again about those boards being okay?" Fin said wryly to Lo, who then heard some canned laughter in response to Fin's quip.

"Okay, I'll talk to Daddy about the staff house next time I see him," Lo responded as she pulled her foot out of the hole now left from her putting it through the rotten board while Fin helped her back up. After Fin tied one end of the rope into a lasso, Lo then twirled the lasso over her head and sent it toward the chimney, successfully roping it before using the rope to climb up the roof to the chimney. Fin then tied the other end of the rope around her waist and, picking up the tool box and the satellite dish to carry with her, got Lo to pull the rope to help her get up the roof.

After marking spots on the north side of the chimney where the screws that would hold the dish in place were to go, then drilling into the marks with a cordless drill, Fin got Lo, who was leaning against the chimney's west side facing toward the top of the roof, to hold the dish in place while she got out a screw and set it into one of the holes to drill into the chimney with the drill, now outfitted with a screwdriver bit. "You sure you've done this before, Lo?" Fin asked the rich girl, who looked slightly hesitant.

"Of course I have," Lo replied. Fin, detecting the bravado in her friend's voice, simply raised an eyebrow at her. "Well...sort of," Lo added, followed by the laugh track. "When Daddy got a new dish for the penthouse a few years ago, he got me to pass him some screws to drill in while Ty held the dish in place."

"Hmm, good to know," Fin said sardonically with a smirk. "Just make sure you keep the dish steady while I put the screw in, okay?" Lo nodded in agreement, but as Fin prepared to put the first screw into the chimney, a yellow jacket flew close to Lo's face and attempted to land there, causing her to freak out and let go of her grip on the dish with her left hand to swat at the wasp.

"_Eeek_, get away from me!" Lo said as she kept swinging at the yellow jacket, now with both hands.

"Lo, be careful!" Fin said abruptly as Lo lost her grip on the dish. Fin barely managed to get the dish as it fell, but as she did so, she lost her grip on the cordless drill, which tumbled down the main roof toward the walkway roof, took a couple of bounces and then went off and landed with a thud a couple of seconds afterward. Turning to Lo with a glare, Fin asked as she outstretched her arms, "What was _that?_"

"I'm sorry, Fin," Lo said apologetically, "but that wasp was flying right in my face and I didn't want to get stung. At least the dish got saved, anyway."

"Yeah, but now I've lost the drill and I have to go back down and get it," Fin replied. "I just hope it didn't get broken when it landed." Lo then got up to help Fin get back down the roof with the rope, but as they got on their feet at the top of the roof, the girls' troubles were just beginning as they heard the sound of familiar laughter, followed by the ladder tipping over and landing with a clatter on the ground. "The ladder!" Fin said with a panicked tone. "What the..."

A moment later, Lo and Fin found out who was behind the laughter and the ladder getting tipped over when they each felt several stinging impacts on their bodies. Looking down, the girls noticed yellow and pink paint splatters on their clothing, then looked toward the source and saw they were being shot at with paintballs by the Marvin brothers. "Haha, take that!" said Todd as he and Mark gleefully continued firing their paintballs at Lo and Fin. Several more shots directed at Lo caused her to stumble backward, but she managed to grab the rope around Fin's waist as Fin ducked on the opposite side of the roof to keep the rich girl on her feet. Lo, however, tripped over the top of the roof with her heels and fell backward into the chimney opening. Fortunately for Lo, the chimney opening was narrow, keeping her from falling in completely as her head, arms and lower legs stuck out from the opening.

As soon as Lo got stuck in the chimney opening, raucous laughter from the laugh track erupted, annoying her to no end this time. "Okay, CUT THE LAUGH TRACK ALREADY!" Lo yelled as she pounded her fists on the rim of the chimney, causing the cannned laughter in her dream to stop abruptly with the sound of a record player needle scratching across a record. Meanwhile, Fin was trying her best to stay up on the roof while dodging flying paintballs whizzing past her, courtesy of the Marvin boys...

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**And here come those nasty Marvin boys again! Even in Lo's dream, it seems like our heroes can't catch a break most of the time when those two brats show up to wreak havoc (at least not on the show, anyway, except for that time in "Waves of Cheese" when Johnny put them and their parents in their place, or in "Grand Theft Whale Bus" when Rosie threatened to drop elbows on one of the kids if he continued dropping dinner buns on the floor of the Pirate Ship). Wait to see what happens next chapter though, when Lo and Fin have to figure out a way to get themselves out of the jam the Marvin brats put them in.**


	4. Don't Mess with Lo!

**CHAPTER 4 - DON'T MESS WITH LO!  
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As her dream continued, Lo found herself in a pickle due to being stuck butt-first in the opening of the staff house chimney thanks to the Marvin brothers shooting paintballs at her, while Fin was in her own predicament as she tried to evade getting hit by paintballs herself as the boys continued firing them with sadistic glee. "You rotten little savages!" Fin yelled down at Todd and Mark in between dodging more paintballs. "When I get down from this roof, you're both gonna be toast!"

"Oh yeah?" Mark replied tauntingly. "How're you gonna do that when there's no ladder for you to get down on?" he added with a cackle of evil laughter before he and Todd resumed firing.

Realizing she needed to do something to help herself and Fin against the bratty boys, Lo thought to herself, _Okay, that is IT! Paintballs or no, I'm gonna fix those kids' wagons but good,_ then she mustered up her strength and began to pull herself out of the chimney opening. Once she got completely out, Lo, whose new teal dress was now almost completely covered with yellow and pink paint from the Marvin boys' paintball guns and soot from the chimney, called "Fin, cover me!" to her friend, then, with surprising dexterity, dashed to the north side of the staff house roof while evading more paintballs coming her way, climbed down to the walkway roof, then grabbed the edge of that roof and, using some gymnastic skills, vaulted down to the second floor walkway, then slid down the rail of the stairway to the main floor porch, jumped onto the porch and then over its railing to the side of the house.

Meanwhile, back on the roof, Fin had found some pine cones on the roof, which had ended up there from the earlier windstorm, and began throwing some of them at the Marvin boys to try to throw off their aim at Lo. Todd and Mark managed to dodge the pine cones, though, and began to double up their efforts in firing their paintballs at Fin. "Okay, now you're really asking for it!" said Todd as the boys continued firing.

Moments later though, the Marvin boys' attention was distracted when a female voice called, "Hey, boys!" Turning their heads to look, they saw Lo standing defiantly a few feet away, brandishing a water hose with a power nozzle sprayer from the side of the staff house. As she now heard the opening guitar riff to "Welcome to the Jungle" begin playing in the background of her dream, Lo said to the bratty brothers with a fiendish grin, "You want to call down the thunder? Well, here's some lightning to go with it!"

Right then, Lo opened fire on Todd and Mark as she squeezed the trigger on the power sprayer attached to the water hose, knocking the paintball guns out of the boys' hands and soaking them from head to toe. "AAAAAHHH! Run for it!" a soaking-wet Mark yelled as he and Todd then ran off back to the hotel. As Lo turned off the hose after the Marvins ran off, canned audience applause and cheering could then be heard by her as she smiled with satisfaction at getting her revenge on the two kids.

* * *

Moments after Lo chased away the Marvin brothers with their well-deserved water hose soaking, Ripper, Reef and Broseph arrived back at the staff house to see what the commotion was. Checking over the front of the house while Ripper got the knocked-over ladder propped back up, then checking on Lo, Broseph asked her, "Wow, what happened here, bra?"

"The Marvin boys happened," answered Lo, who then explained about the events that went down when she and Fin tried to install the new satellite dish, while Ripper climbed up to the walkway roof to help Fin down.

As soon as Reef saw the mess that was Lo's new dress, he began to point and laugh derisively at her expense. "Wow, Lo, who designed your dress, Picasso?" he said, then began laughing again before he was hit in the back of his head with a spare pine cone thrown at him by Fin. "Ow!" Reef yelped, rubbing his head. "That stings! What was that for?"

"Serves you right, kook!" Fin responded as she climbed down the ladder to the ground.

Thanks to Reef's comment about her dress, Lo looked down and looked at it. "Oh, no! My dress!" she said, noticing that now, not only was the dress covered with yellow and pink paint splatters and chimney soot, there was also a rip on the lower part of the dress from just above the knee down to the hem, apparently caused by snagging on something as Lo did her acrobatic escape from the Marvin boys' paintball fire. "It's ruined! I just bought it and now it's a mess!" Lo then wailed as she began to cry over the loss of her now-ruined dress, but Fin, who was now back on the ground after coming down from the roof, went over to comfort her friend.

"It's okay Lo, don't cry," Fin said to the rich girl, putting her right arm over Lo's shoulders and offering her a Kleenex to wipe her tears with. "I got shot up with paintballs too and my outfit got messed up, but I'm not crying over it - I'm planning a little revenge of my own," she added with a smirk and a gleam in her eye as she had the Marvin boys in mind.

"Really?" Lo said, dabbing at her eyes with the tissue as she got what Fin had in mind.

"Yep," Fin replied with a nod. "Anyway, look at the bright side to all this - thanks to your idea, we now have a new widescreen TV with satellite for the staff house. No more one-channel TV universe for us."

"Sweet!" said Broseph, who had overheard Fin talking. "Does it even come with those satellite music channels?"

"Seventy of them in all," said Lo as she wiped away her remaining tears.

"_Cool_," Broseph said in his Caribbean accent. "Reggae channel, here I come!"

"And now I can watch _Dorm Life_ in first-run again!" Reef added, to which Fin rolled her eyes.

"See what I mean?" Fin said reassuringly to Lo. "The guys are already happy, and so will the rest of the girls as soon as they hear about the new set. Everything worked out in the end."

"Yeah, you're right," Lo agreed. "But then, things will work out even better when we can get the guys to finish the job we started on the dish installation, right?"

"True that," Fin said with a giggle. The light-hearted moment was interrupted a moment later, though, when a yell came from the direction of one of the third-floor windows.

"Okay, who broke the window in my room?" said Reef, sticking his head through the open window of his room.

Lo and Fin looked at each other with sly glances, as though they knew how to respond. "Go ask the Marvin boys!" Lo called back, and she and Fin began laughing, joined by the laugh track, then by canned applause and more 1950s sitcom background music.

* * *

A moment later, Lo woke up from her dream with a start, then turned on the lamp on her bedside stand. Checking out the surroundings of the girls' room, Lo was relieved to see that everything was in color again as she let out a sigh of relief. Fin, however, was also woken up the moment Lo's lamp went on. "Hey, what gives?" Fin asked as she sat up in her bed.

"Oh, I just woke up from this weird dream I was having," Lo said as she also sat up.

"It wasn't, like, a nightmare, was it?" Fin said with a yawn as she got up to go sit on the side of Lo's bed.

"No, nothing like that," Lo replied. "I dreamed that I was a character in one of those old TV comedies - the real old ones, you know, like in black-and-white? On top of that, I was even dreaming in black-and-white, like I was in such a show."

"Oh," said Fin with a laugh. "Was it because of those _Lacey Show_ videos and those other old shows we watched on YouView earlier?"

"I guess so," Lo said. "Thing is, you were in my dream too, and we got into all kinds of wacky adventures, just like in those old shows."

"Oh yeah, sounds like it, all right," Fin said with another giggle. "But that's all it was, just a dream," she added as she put her hand on Lo's shoulder. "It's not like we get into such crazy misadventures in real life, right?"

"I could say that was true," Lo said, "if it wasn't for Reef and his hot-dogging, or all the pranks and jokes, or all the other stuff that goes on around the hotel when we get important guests. Even Bummer's blowouts would be funny if it weren't for him being the day manager here."

"Well," Fin mused, "you're right about that - especially about Reef and Bummer." After she and Lo shared another laugh, Fin then yawned again. "Okay, 'night Lo, sleep tight," she said as she went back to her own bed.

"'night, Fin," Lo said. Turning off her lamp and laying back down in her bed, Lo then grabbed her teddy bear and held it close to her as she turned on her side, then began thinking about the dream she had moments earlier. _Okay, maybe Fin has a point,_ Lo thought to herself. _The stuff the gang gets into may or may not be as kooky as what we saw on those old TV shows online, or what happened in my dream. Then again..._ she added with a smile as she closed her eyes and cuddled her teddy bear again, _that dream did give me a good idea about getting a new TV set for the staff house._

**THE END**


End file.
